China quake toll goes past 62,000

Xinhua Beijing, May 25 (Xinhua) The toll in the May 12 earthquake in southwest China’s Sichuan province has risen to 62,664 lives, the State Council’s information department said Sunday. It said the quake left some 358,816 injured and 23,775 missing as of 12:00 a.m. Sunday.

Guo Weimin, director of the State Council Information Office, said a total of 638,305 people had been rescued and evacuated to safety by the military and civilian rescuers.

A DPA report said: Eleven days after the powerful earthquake that struck south-western China, an 80-year-old man has been rescued from a collapsed building, state television reported Sunday.

The report said the man had been bound to his bed because he was partially paralysed.

The man was not injured when the building collapsed and was found hiding under a support beam. His wife was able to give him water, thereby saving his life.

Rescue troops found the elderly couple on Friday in the city of Mianzhu in Sichuan province. Using their bare hands, the troops moved the beams and rubble to pull the man from the building. Xinhua